Leaderboard

Who’s the more foolish: the fool or the fool who follows him? That's what will be on the lips of all that are coming to the drive on Friday and we now have a full drive. Goutam @Goutam Watteau @Watteau varunmehndiratta @varunmehndiratta Dodi Syahdar @Dodi Syahdar Ashok chaturvedi @Ashok chaturvedi Gok Krish @Gok Krish Tariq Carrimjee @Tariq Carrimjee Niki @Niki Kalahari @Kalahari Ahab Shamaa @Ahab Shamaa You are all confirmed. If anyone drops out, @Thomas Varghese gets a drive. IM drive so please all be ready and prepared to go. I will post the final start point tomorrow as I am still undecided about where the best entry point might be. See you soon in the sand.

Firstly, it's not mandatory to lift your car only for the sake of driving off-road in the sand. The ample amount of stock cars in Carnity that venture into the desert every weekend is a testimony for that. But then you have mentioned a 2-2.5 inch lift, which is not too big. Now for a 2 - 2.5 inch lift, a body lift kit with spacers would be sufficient as this doesn't tamper with the factory suspension settings and would also give you sufficient stability on the road. The suspension lift kit is generally for bigger lifts (4 inch and above) and would need alteration of your entire setup which would cost signicantly more. In both cases you can then install slightly bigger tyres which improves the overall look of the car. But do remember, if you go crazy on increasing the tyre size you will then land in the other issue of car feeling sluggish which might result in a possible regearing and entering the never ending cycle of mods. Welcome to the Jeep World 😂

as more senior member, you'll be 2nd lead and i'll pull you out of the black hole Interstellar-style... hope you don't grow a beard while waiting to be pulled out tho 😂

PCR done 👍 Looking forward to the drive with all of you!

Thank you @Alfred Alinazar for informing me . Hope to see you i another drive. @Lakshmi Narasimhan I am adding you to the drive, please confirm the same.

I like this topic. My question for you will be "what kind of off-roading are you planning to do?". If you will limit to our weekends on the dessert in UAE, don't bother lifting your jeep. It is not required for what we do here. The Wrangler is already the most capable Offroad vehicle as it comes from the factory. If you already have 1" lift, my advice is DON'T TOUCH IT and enjoy it as it is. Sand off-roading don't require that much of a clearance. It is more about engine power, light vehicle and driver's wrists and feet. It is true that bigger jeeps look better, but for sand is actually better not to be too big for many reasons: weight, gravity center, gas autonomy, power compromise, etc. But if you want to do rocks and mud on the wadis, then that is another story. If that is your thing let me know. I am looking for a partner to do that, hahahaha.

Hello @Darren Brooke @Anoop Nair @Rawad .. it’s Wed and 2nd drive is open .. pls RSVP if you still want to help me find Bambi 🤣

Hi @Ale Vallecchi, thank you very much, but I have organized something else for the weekend, please remove me from the list.

I work for Cansco Well Control

Dear Desertnauts - @FARAZ MOHAMMED, @Damiru Dharmadasa, @James Thorn, @Jason Grima, @Yawa, @Alexander Holodny, @shu yang, @SUNIL KUMAR, @Senthil Kumar - Welcome to my 100th Carnity drive. While I usually provide a detailed preview of the drive, this time the briefing is simple: have fun, and enjoy together the most beautiful parts of Qudra. There will be dunes, of course, as well as animals, trees, rock formations and lakes. We'll start easy, using the basic off-roading skills, progressing to slightly more complicated terrains, based on the convoy's behavior. Bring your cameras, as we'll try to make this a more photographic drive then others, taking some time to shoot some of the sights we'll drive by. The next instructions will include the details of how to reach the meeting point (which is a little tricky), and the convoy order. Until then, enjoy your week.

After last week's drive I pressed the rear defrost button unattentively and it got stuck on the "On" position because of sand. It is causing not only to AC to not work but blowing hot air inside the cabin as the front defrost is also getting activated. I tried but failed to pry it out and took it to a off-brand service centre mentally deliberating whether I should have taken it to the service centre. The off brand person advised me to take it to the official service centre, so I did. My Jeep has been at the service centre since Saturday morning, and they are trying to figure out some jugad or something to rectify it. As usual their first intention was to replace the entire switch panel, but they don't have any here and it will take months to order one here. Apart from ranting, the purpose of my post is to ask what could I have done differently.

Hey Carnity friends, Just wanted to trouble for some advice; My rubicon is lifted stock at 1inch. I like the look of 2.5inch height but I’m not sure if I should go with a body lift or full lift kit? What would you suggest? I do want to maintain a comfortable ride on the road but also have the right support when off roading. I’d driven a friends jeep previously and it had been lifted 2.5inch but felt all over the place when on the road. Thank you

WL: @Yusuf Esaf @Werno @Nihal17

Thanks confirmed

Thanks @Islam SolimanI have added myself to the drive. See you on Saturday..😁

exactly, and the fact that a group of guys from garages in UAE recommend it, in my opinion, reinforces the Carnity mentality. I personally found that useful.

Sorry, but I couldnt find any major useful information on the video other than the fact that if you have the money you can upgrade your suspensions. Also the fact that the video has been put out by a garage that earns a living on doing modifications (even if not necessary). The only meaningful thing one guy in the video mentioned, which we at Carnity always recommend, is that first try your vehicle in whatever condition it is and once you feel you have reached the limit thats when you start looking at what next, but in an knowledgeable and informed manner and not just because you have been pressurized by the club with whom you are currently driving.

Morning, recommend you to watch this video.

Congratulations @Goutam....this info is just wow...!!!

Zed how are you bro , hope wel , I checked on google map to see the size of that mini lake , it looks like a black hole 🕳 bro , make sure we all come driving our car not carrying our car 😄

Roll Cage is not allowed for passenger cars, unless with prior permissions in Dubai/UAE. Tourist companies which have roll cages in their land cruisers are done after permission for modifications from RTA. As far as I knew , RTA doesn't pass cars with unauthorised roll cage modifications at yearly tests. Please correct me if wrong😊

Stock Xterra tow hook is inherently weak and some older models had a wierd open D type hook which used to slip at some angle while pulling Three bolt is way safer than the stock, and make two instead of one at the front . And use Grade 10 bolts which are stronger. ( or if you can find Nissan sells the bolts separately for the tow hooks) Periodic inspection is very important to avoid failure as one can pick up rust/bends before they break. Use harness rope/safety rope while pulling especially from front , to protect in an unfortunate tow hook failure situation.

Generally the front tow hook in Xterra is inherently weak due to 2 bolts points of attachment. And I recommend to install a minimum of three bolt attachment tow hook since this has happened. However periodic inspection to the integrity of the tow hooks be it front or back for rust, bend, loosening … etc is extremely important especially after being recovered or you were the recovery car in your last drive .

2 bolts won't take the load. The rear recovery point on my patrol is fixed to 5 bolts for a reason! Some on the side and some on the buttom of the ladder frame.

@Hardik Mody definitely 3-hole is stronger, the 3rd vertical square hole will hold while the 2 horizontal holes get pulled and rotated (from the bolts): If you have friends in Fabrication shop, hand them this 3D design file so they can fabricate it for you: The resulting product:

You were really lucky enough that no damage happen to the recovery car and caused any injury, which is a biggest nightmare for any tow point failure. Just curious if it happened on soft or medium or harder tug, just to understand the intensity. If its hard tug, the tow rope was secured with support rope or dampers....? I am not an Xterra expert so will that Xterra point for other Xterra owners to add. From my side I can only say that all tow points (front and back) for any vehicle should have the minimum 3 bolts placement, 4 is awesome like in pintle hook of LC and Patrols.

It is safe if it is padded and I guess the driver must wear a helmet. Otherwise might be more dangerous.

Goutam @Goutam Watteau @Watteau varunmehndiratta @varunmehndiratta Dodi Syahdar @Dodi Syahdar Ashok chaturvedi @Ashok chaturvedi Gok Krish @Gok Krish Tariq Carrimjee @Tariq Carrimjee Niki @Niki Kalahari @Kalahari The question on everyone's lips: the decision to join this drive, brave or stupid? Middle of summer, middle of the most technical dune complex in Dubai, long way to Last Exit or Faqa, incredible high dunes and ridges waiting to be conquered, or ... What can I tell you about the plan. We need to take into account that the convoy has a mixed car makeup, from the largest to the smallest and that this is an IM drive and not Extreme. So ... I am looking for a routing that's going to be challenging at a technical level, has enough thrills and adrenalin to keep everyone happy and leaves us still able to get out of the sand in time for Spicy Village opening up for breakfast. Will we succeed? Difficult to tell. Everyone on the drive is has excellent control of their car and experience in IM. It's a great area in which to play and challenge ourselves. There's no-one with reliability issues on their car. So expect criss crossing, riding ridges and small technical areas where a slip will lead to a world of pain ... I give you: Lisaili.

Hi @Brette, im looking to practice being in support roles before applying this winter, hope you'll take me on for one of those :D

Had my first pop-out in previous Intermediate drive through Lisali with you Richard. Need to break through it to get over that feeling. Looking forward.

Yeah working on this cresting thing @Kailas over last few drives managed it well however agree with you need to work on it for consistency, honestly sometime it's more of overconfidence that does it for me - always a small dune that gets me crested. ...didn't had any refusals through the ride . was a pretty smooth drive for me till the last min one at fag end where came too close to Gautam while gliding through the bowls..

Hi Mario, the new channels are on 6.25 as well, but let me reiterate a little bit on that, sorry if it becomes a bit technical here below: If you put your Radio in VFO mode (this the manual mode where you can type in any frequency), you can with turning your rotary dial on the top of the radio (for example Motorola MT777) go up or down in steps. This is the so called step frequency. Most of us are using the channel mode in which your rotary dial knob goes through the programmed channels, so that step frequency is not important. However in some model radios, if you want to program a certain frequency, it will not always accept a certain frequency that is located in-between two "steps", hence we used to provide the step frequency as well. The reason that frequencies have steps is because of how FM (Frequency Modulation) works: When you are broadcasting on a frequency for example 446.00625, you will be in fact broadcasting in-between 445.986 and 446.026. This is a 20Khz wideband bandwidth. And this is also the main reason why our carnity frequencies are not randomly chosen, they are selected to make sure there is enough room in between the channels so there is no interference. Compare it with Sheikh Zayed road which has 6 lanes. The white lines that represent each lane have a certain width, or bandwidth. As long as you remain in your lane you will not interfere with others. The width of the lanes are chosen to accommodate vehicles from different sizes like lorries, SUV's, or sedans. The 20Khz bandwidth is basically the width of each lane, as our radio transmit our voices over this width. I hope i did not give you a headache now

Sorry @Anish S, I'm unable to join this drive. Hope to see you on future drives.

@BretteI will have to drop out as I realized its my daughters birthday! Apologies - pls remove me from the list and hope it will allow others to join the drive. Have a safe drive everyone...